Never But Once
by Megaman-NT-Warrior
Summary: It's not every day that Astrid lets someone touch her hair. In fact, it's never. But who could ever say no to Rapunzel? [Rapunzel/Astrid; Drabble]


"What do you think you're doing?" Astrid asks sharply the moment she feels those gentle hands tug at the end of her braid. One arm raises to bat Rapunzel away from her hair and she feels the older girl flop down in the grass beside her.

"I would think," and Astrid can't help a small, private, smile at how regal Rapunzel sounds in that moment. "That the woman who cut my hair very short while knowing that it doesn't grow back would let me play with hers every once and a while."

"Would she now?" Astrid teases, rolling over on her back so her braid's trapped between her and the ground. It's a mistake because now she can see Rapunzel who's glaring down at her without glaring, giving her that angry pout that she can't say no to.

"Astrid." It's not good that she has this much power over her. Rapunzel doesn't back down, they're stubborn like that, and she's too dear to her to disappoint. Especially over this. "You're not going to be training until later and there's plenty of time to put it back up if we get attacked."

"We're in public," she sighs but Rapunzel either doesn't understand the problem or is happy to ignore it knowing that she will eventually get her own way. She keeps eye contact, green on blue, even as she leans forward slightly and lights one hand on the inside of her elbow. The pout deepens. "Fine but only for you."

"Yay!" It's worth it to see her smile like that and hear her laugh and Astrid turns back over so she's lying with her head resting on her folded arms. Rapunzel doesn't wait to give her a chance to change her mind and quickly pulls the leather tie from her braid. It feels nice, she grudgingly admits, to have Rapunzel's fingers running through her hair and she can't remember the last time she'd let someone else do her hair. Probably her mother and that had been a long time ago indeed.

"Hey, Astrid, wake up. They'll be expecting you in the academy soon." Astrid starts upright as a gentle hand shakes her shoulder and Rapunzel laughs as she dodges just in time to prevent a collision. The sun's significantly lower in the sky that she remembered and a loose lock of hair sticks to her cheek from where it had been pressed against her arm.

"What happened?"

"You fell asleep. I didn't want to wake you but you'd be put out if you missed training," Rapunzel says sweetly as she goes back to making a flower chain out of march violets. Astrid sits up and stretches before rubbing the back of her neck, fingers bumping against her braid. Rapunzel had put it back the way she had found it. "You should hurry, they'll worry if you're late."

"No they'll gossip and that's far worse. It's just flying drills today." And Astrid watches Rapunzel's face light up when she gets to her feet and Rapunzel doesn't think she can see. She hates the sparring days, when Astrid comes back to their house covered in bruises and scrapes, even though she'll never say anything. Training's important to Berk and fighting is important to Astrid so Rapunzel doesn't want to step in the way of that. "Thank you for..." She gestures vaguely at her head, the aborted movement turning into running her fingers through the loose hair hanging by the side of her face. "That was nice."

She runs all the way to the academy, slipping in the gate just as Hiccup's doing his final checks on Toothless' saddle. But she is late, the perfectly chorused catcalls from the twins tell her that. And they know her too well to cow under her glare.

"Sorry to tear you away from a date with your girlfriend," Hiccup calls in that teasing tone he'd perfected ever since they'd broken up and started seeing other people. So she just cuffs him across the back of the head before walking over to greet Stormfly. Fishlegs and Meatlug are next to them as they prep for a flight and he keeps shooting her covert glances.

"What?"

"I was wondering why she wanted that."

"Why who wanted what?"

"Rapunzel, a few days ago she asked me for one of the dragon tooth necklaces I make. Didn't really seem like her style but I just figured that she wanted to try and fit in a bit more around here. Now I have the real answer." He sounds so cheerful, like he had found the absolute best outcome for a situation.

"I'm sorry, I'm not following this time." And her glare does nothing to stop him from sighing and rolling his eyes at her.

"Your hair." Her hand immediately flies to her head, prompting a small chuckle from Fishlegs as he goes back to stroking Meatlug's nose. What she had assumed was her typical simple braid was far more intricate than she could have ever have done on her own and woven through it was a string of the blunted, polished dragon teeth that Fishlegs was so known for making.

"I- She..."

"Seems she knows you pretty well already."


End file.
